Tertiary Education Union members from the Dunedin, Timaru, Ashburton, Christchurch and Oamaru campuses of Aoraki Polytechnic today vowed to fight planned programme closures they say are detrimental to students, the communities they work in, and their institution.

Aoraki Polytechnic told staff at 10 days ago of proposals that would close a range of programmes across all five communities. Twenty jobs are under threat, and several hundred potential students could be affected if the changes go ahead.

TEU national president Sandra Grey was at the stopwork meeting in Timaru where Aoraki staff discussed current collective agreement negotiations and the proposed changes. She said staff see no justification for the proposed closures.

“These are professionals committed to quality tertiary education provision in their communities. They are committed to protecting their communities’ rights to access teaching and learning at all levels,” said Dr Grey.

TEU members will be making submissions to Aoraki senior management on the proposed changes and will be working with students and members of the public to do the same.